Behavioral and Neuro-EconomicsICES is combining cognitive neuroscience with economics to create a new area of study: Neuro-economics. Current breakthroughs in neuroscience models and technologies allow us to study in vivo brain activity as people solve such problems as making choices between alternative actions, forming expectations about the future, carrying out plans, and engaging in personal and impersonal exchange with others. The fundamental question that we ask is: how does the embodied brain produce economic behavior? We hypothesize that answers to this question will allow us to understand, and build, economic institutions that serve as extensions of our minds' capacity to make sound economic decisions and enable social exchange. This approach is in stark contrast to standard economic models that treat economic institutions as constraints on economic behavior.
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